


The Emotional Maturity of a Blueberry Scone

by Chash



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Friends With Benefits
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-18
Updated: 2016-01-18
Packaged: 2018-05-14 19:28:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5755435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chash/pseuds/Chash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarke starts having casual sex with Lincoln. Bellamy deals with this spectacularly well, obviously.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Emotional Maturity of a Blueberry Scone

Maybe it's unfair that Bellamy assumed Clarke would come to him if she wanted casual sex. After all, it's not like he even knows he's her type. But he has more casual sex than anyone else she knows, and he's pretty sure all their mutual friends who have slept with him have enjoyed the experience and spoken fondly of it, so, really. If Clarke was looking for someone to have casual sex with, she should have come to him.

"I mean, come on. If you wanted to have casual sex, you'd ask me, right?"

"Yeah, because if you were fucking me, it would be casual," says Miller. "If you were fucking Clarke, it wouldn't be casual sex. It would be _I'm too much of a chickenshit to tell you I'm in love with you_ sex."

"She doesn't know that. Because of the whole chickenshit thing. So why wouldn't she ask me to have casual sex with her?"

"Why are you asking me? Ask her."

He snorts. "Yeah, there is no good way to ask someone why they don't want to have casual sex with you. And any answer would suck, right?"

Miller actually thinks this over. "Half of them would probably be good, right? There are two reasons to not have casual sex with someone, basically. One, you don't want to have sex with them. That one sucks. Two, you want to have sex with them, but you don't want it to be casual. That's the one you're looking for."

"Or--" he starts, but he thinks Miller might actually be right, most of the reasons would fit into those broad categories. "Maybe she just doesn't want to screw stuff up with us," he says.

"Second one," he says.

"You can worry about casual sex affecting your friendship," he says. 

"Okay, but that still means she wants to have sex with you." There's a pause, and then Miller rubs his face. "I can't believe you're making me have this conversation. Look, Clarke's sex life is Clarke's business. I'm not going to break it down with you. If you want to ask her, ask her. Otherwise, leave it alone." He pauses. "And if you're jealous, fucking _tell her_."

"I'm not jealous, I'm offended," he mutters. "I'm a great fuckbuddy." Miller doesn't look like he believes it, and Bellamy can't blame him. "Okay, yeah," he grants. "You're right. I'll deal with it."

*

His first solution to his problem is to ask Raven to hook up with him, which is not the _worst_ way to deal with a problem, but is certainly not a good one.

She raises her eyebrows at him. "Do you and Clarke have some kind of bet going?"

"About what?"

"I don't know. Some fucked up thing about which of you can hook up with me first? Or more of us? Whatever it is, I don't want to get involved."

His frown deepens. "You hooked up with Clarke?"

"No, she just asked me if I would," Raven says, absent. "When she was looking for a fuckbuddy. Please tell me she's not sleeping with Lincoln on a bet. He's a nice guy, he doesn't deserve that."

"She asked _you_?"

Raven glares at him, but her expression softens as she watches him, which is actually worse. "Oh my god, you guys didn't make a bet. You're pissed she didn't want to fuck you."

"She said that?" he can't help asking, and Raven snorts.

"She didn't mention you at all." She pauses, and then adds, like she's relishing it, "She asked Wells before she asked me."

"Fuck. I wasn't even in her fucking _top three_ fuck buddies?"

"Four."

" _Four_?"

"She said she was going to ask that girl Maya? So I think Lincoln was four." Bellamy glares at her, and she just beams wider. "I'm sure you were number five."

" _Five_. What the fuck? You told her I was good in bed, right? You didn't just say that to make me feel better, did you? I'm open to feedback."

Raven bursts out laughing, which is honestly no less than he deserves. "Dude. Are you asking me to hook up with you because you're offended Clarke got another fuckbuddy?"

"No."

"Uh huh. Look, it's not a big deal."

"I'm a great fuckbuddy," he mutters. "I can't believe she has _four people_ she thinks would be better fuckbuddies than I would."

"And you want a fuckbuddy to show her how much better you'd be?"

"No," he says. "New plan."

"If the old plan was this shitty, I can't wait for you to never tell me about the new plan," Raven says, and Bellamy gives her an overly peppy smile.

"Don't worry, I never will."

*

Bellamy knows the following things about Lincoln Thompson: he's four years older than Clarke and two years older than Bellamy, Clarke met him in grad school, and he's a high-school teacher and part-time artist. Before he started casually sleeping with Clarke, Bellamy would have said he liked Lincoln. Okay, he'd still say he likes Lincoln, but just because it would be really shitty of him to start hating a guy just for sleeping with Clarke. He can't blame Lincoln for taking her up on the offer; he's amazed three other people turned her down first.

And that's--concerning. Not on an individual level; he doesn't think Wells would know how to be someone's fuckbuddy, Raven is mostly straight, and he doesn't know Maya that well but there are all sorts of reasons she might not want to fuck Clarke. But it's worrying that Clarke is looking for a casual thing this hard. Just because she's never done casual before, and now she's apparently decided she wants it enough to work her way through their friends.

Which is how he decides to try to hook up Lincoln and his sister.

It's not the _only_ reason, of course. After all, he loves Octavia, and there's no way he'd ever try to set her up with someone he thought would be bad for her, or someone he didn't like. But Lincoln is honestly exactly the kind of guy he can see O really liking. He'd been wanting to introduce them anyway. But now, it's also important, from an academic perspective. He wants to see if Clarke will find a new fuckbuddy, and how long it will take her to ask him.

He might also be something of an asshole. Just a little.

If Clarke hadn't mentioned the whole friends-with-benefits things, Bellamy honestly wouldn't have known about it. She and Lincoln are the same as always when they go out in a group, casual, easy friends who make fun of each other. Bellamy finds himself watching a little more closely than he used to, but--it's different, knowing Lincoln was her fourth choice. It still sucks out loud, of course, but in a different way. Before, he thought she was maybe secretly in love with Lincoln; now, he thinks she's probably just fucked up about her string of bad relationships.

A real friend would probably try to have a conversation with her about it. Instead, he invites Octavia to their regular bar for drinks.

"I thought you wanted to keep our friend groups separate so you wouldn't be the creepy dude hanging out with his sister."

"Yeah, but everyone just thinks you're too embarrassed to be seen with me in public, so I think letting you hang out with me is probably the less pathetic option."

Octavia snorts. "You're such a loser, Bell."

"Yeah, yeah. Come on, I like my friends, I like you. Miller has a thing for your friend Monty. It's time to start integrating our social circles."

She still seems a little mistrustful, which he can't blame her for. He is, after all, not being honest with her about his motivations and probably acting kind of sketchy. She's a discerning person who can tell when she's being bullshitted. But about ninety percent of everything he says is at least some level of bullshit, so she can't be too distrustful. And he knows she really, really wants to meet his friends.

Clarke's delighted to see her, of course.

"Is this your sister? Holy shit, hi!"

Bellamy met Clarke his junior year of college. He was in an art-history class to try to impress girls, and she was a freshman, planning on doing some sort of art stuff as part of her degree. Unfortunately, it turned out he was terrible at art history, so it ended up being less impressive and more sad, but Clarke decided she wanted to take him under her wing. They'd become study buddies and then friends.

He's never bothered pinpointing the exact moment he fell in love with her; it never seemed important. All he knows is that it's been five years, and he loves her _now_. A lot.

Eventually, he might even figure out how to tell her.

Now, though, he just slings his arm around her, companionable, and says, "Yup, this is O. O, this is Clarke."

"Oh, _you're_ Clarke," says Octavia. She graduated from college herself a few months ago, and Bellamy dealt with how excited he was about her moving to his city by pretending he wasn't happy about it and refusing to introduce her to his friends.

As always, he's a master of appropriate emotional reactions.

Clarke ducks out from under his arm, but it's so she can give Octavia a hug, so he doesn't mind. "I have heard so much about you," she tells O. "I'm going to buy you a drink and you can tell me all of Bellamy's embarrassing childhood stories."

"That'll take at least three drinks," says O. "Not because I'm not going to tell you, just because he has _so many embarrassing stories_. Did you know he used to have braces? I have pictures on my phone."

"Why do you have pictures of me with braces on your phone?" he grumbles. "You must have specifically saved them."

"For times like this," she says, grinning at him as Clarke takes her to the bar.

Bellamy's pretty happy himself, honestly. Watching Clarke and Octavia hang out is his new favorite thing, which is probably sad. That's why he's not going to examine it.

It's not hard to get Octavia and Lincoln talking once they're all sitting together. Miller definitely notices, and he thinks Raven probably does too, but he barely even did anything. It might be obvious, but all he actually does is tell O that Lincoln is the swimming coach at the school where he works, and O was competitive in college, so that sets them off. Plus, Lincoln is exactly her type, so he's not a bad person or anything.

Or, well, not _that_ bad a person. And Lincoln and Clarke aren't serious, anyway. He's doing good, broadly.

The third time Octavia comes out with them, she calls him out on it after.

"So, Lincoln and Clarke are--"

"Currently fucking," he says. "In a non-serious way, apparently."

Octavia smacks him in the back of the head. "I can't believe you!"

"What?"

"You totally introduced me to your friends so I'd hit on Lincoln because you're too non-functional to just ask the girl you're in love with on a date! Which is seriously shitty. She's allowed to have sex."

"Of course she is." He's not surprised Octavia figured it out, he just figured it wouldn't happen this soon. He'd been hoping that by the time she caught on, she'd be too into Lincoln to derail him. "Look, I'm--I thought you guys would get along, okay? I thought that before he and Clarke started sleeping together."

"I can't believe you put me in the middle of this," she says, glaring. "Now if I like him I'm being a dick and enabling your stupid Clarke thing!" He must wince, because she softens a little. "I meant not telling her. It's not stupid that you like her. She's awesome, of course you like her. But you need to talk to her."

"You know, Lincoln was at least fourth on her fuckbuddies list. She asked three other people first. So it's not like she's particularly into him," he mutters.

"One, it's creepy that you know that. Two, what number are you?"

"I don't know."

"So you're annoyed that she wants to sleep with him more than she wants to sleep with you. Get your act together, Bell."

"Yeah. Sorry. But--I really did want to introduce you to Lincoln."

"You don't think he's too old for me? If I brought him home, you'd say he was too old for me."

"I would," he grants. "But that would be because I'm a dick and I wouldn't know him and I'd assume the worst. Because I'm a dick."

"And you don't trust my judgment."

"I don't trust _guys_ ," he says. At her unimpressed scowl, he sighs and rubs his face. "Okay, I haven't fully accepted that you're capable of making informed decisions about things. But--I genuinely think Lincoln is a good guy and you should think about going out with him."

"I'm not breaking up him and Clarke."

"They aren't _dating_ ," he says, and she kicks him. "Yeah, fine. I'll talk to her."

"Good."

*

Two days later, he hasn't talked to Clarke yet, but he figures he's allowed to need a little time to figure himself out. He has, after all, been failing to say anything for five years. It's not the kind of thing that he can just sort out in a couple days, even if Octavia did a good job making him feel shitty for not having done it sooner.

Then, Clarke shows up on his doorstep, looking at him with a calculating expression. "Were you trying to set up your sister and Lincoln?"

If he had been prepared for the question, he would have lied, but instead he bursts out, "Jesus, was it that obvious?"

Clarke just snorts. "Yeah, you suck at subtle. Sorry. You should have told me, I would have helped."

He pauses; she slides past him into the apartment and flops down on his couch. "You would have?" he asks, following her.

"Yeah, she seems like she'd be really good for him."

"But you guys are--" he starts, and isn't sure how to go on, because he's already kind of admitted he was trying to break them up, so expressing concern for their non-relationship is probably just weird at this point.

Clarke doesn't seem to notice, though. She waves her hand, dismissive. "I can probably find someone else for casual hookups. I'm not worried."

It's the best opportunity he's going to get to talk to her about it, so he shifts a little, leans his elbows on his knees. "That's what you're looking for now? Casual?"

"Don't tell me you're suddenly against casual sex," she says, her voice teasing.

"No, it's just--that's never really been your thing. Historically speaking. And now you seem pretty gung-ho about it." Her eyebrows shoot up, and he winces. "Raven, uh, mentioned some stuff."

"Mentioned some stuff."

"She said you asked her and Wells and--"

Clarke props her chin on her hand, amused. "Are you monitoring my sex life, Bellamy?"

"Not on purpose."

She clucks her tongue, but then nods, like she's making up her mind. "It seemed like the best choice, yeah."

"Did you make a pros and cons list?" he can't help teasing. "What were the other choices?"

"I was getting tired of shitty relationships, but--I like having someone to hook up with. Casual sex works for a lot of people. I figured it could maybe work for me."

"And you think it is?"

"It went pretty well with Lincoln, I guess. I got orgasms and I'm not in love with him. That's the goal of casual sex, right? Fun and you're cool if it ends?"

She sounds like she really doesn't know, and Bellamy feels a little like his heart is breaking. It's not like he thinks Clarke _can't_ have a good, fun, casual thing. He'd just much rather she had someone who loved her, someone she could get attached to who wouldn't break her heart. 

"Seriously, what's this about?" he asks, voice gentle.

"Every time I fall for someone, it goes badly," she says. "Finn, bad end. Lexa, bad end. I've told two people I love them, and they both broke my heart. I'm sick of that."

It's been two years since Lexa, so it seems like a weird thing to have caused a current crisis. "Yeah, I get that. But--it's good too, right?"

Her smile is wry. "Don't tell me _you're_ going to go on about true love, Bellamy."

"Why can't I?"

"I don't think you've ever dated anyone for more than a week since I met you."

He hasn't ever sat down and done the math, but he's willing to trust her on this one. She sounds pretty confident. "Yeah, but I still think being in love is worth it." He wets his lips. "Look, it sucks a lot of the time, don't get me wrong, and I'm sure when it goes wrong it hurts even more. I get all that. But--it's got to be worth it, right? I'm not even dating you, and it's worth it. I'd never--I wouldn't want to lose this. Even if--" 

He realizes only when he sees she's staring at him what he said, and he feels heat creep up his neck.

"Keep going," she says, soft.

"Even if you break my heart," he finishes, matching her tone. "You're still worth it."

"That might be more convincing if you'd ever told me."

"I was working on it. Really. Besides, the longer I didn't tell you, the better chance there was you got serious about someone else and broke my heart. I thought Lexa might have been it. And it would still be worth it."

"Bellamy," she says, and this might be it now. Her breaking his heart.

"I thought maybe you knew," he says, fast, before she can go on. "I thought that was why I wasn't in your top five casual sex partners."

Of course, she starts laughing. "Oh my god, were you _counting_?"

"Not on purpose! Just--"

She ducks her head, so she's not looking at him when she says, "You would never be a casual sex partner, Bellamy."

His heart stops, and then it soars. "Oh."

"That's it?" she asks, but she's amused, definitely. "You definitely started this whole thing, by the way. You were, um--we did that stupid charity run a few weeks ago and you were all sweaty and you tried to wipe your face off with your shirt and I just kind of--knew. And you don't date, so--"

"Oh," he says again, and then laughs. "Sorry, uh--yeah. My sister threatened to kill me if I didn't talk to you like an adult instead of using her to try to split you and Lincoln up."

"And how was that going?"

"Shitty," he admits, and she laughs, shifts a little closer. "Is this when I ask you out?" he continues. "This one's new for me, I don't--"

The press of her mouth against his is firm and sure, but he can feel a slight tremble in her hand on his leg, as if there's some part of her that still isn't sure this won't go wrong. Not that he can blame her. He wraps his own hand around her wrist, tugs her in, kisses her back gently, slowly. He's going to remember this forever; he wants it to be good.

Clarke whimpers and slides all the way into his lap, legs bracketing his as she opens her mouth for him, takes control when he isn't going quickly enough. She whimpers when his hand slides up her side and moans when his other gropes her ass.

"Do we need to talk?" he asks, voice already husky. It feels important. If he fucks this up because he wasn't clear about what he wants, he's never going to forgive himself. "About--"

"You love me," she says, with a smile. "You said so."

"Yeah," he agrees. "I'm--yeah. I'm in love with you."

"Me too," she says. "Anything else to talk about?"

"So, uh, if you _weren't_ in love with me, I'd be the first person you asked for casual sex, right?"

There's a pause, and then she punches him in the shoulder and dissolves into laughter. "You know if you hadn't said that, we could have just had non-casual sex, but now I'm just--you're such a _dork_."

"I'm great at casual sex," he says. "I would have been a really good choice."

"You're in love with me, that's the opposite of casual."

"You didn't know! So--"

She kisses him again. "So you're my number-one choice for sex. Period. Happy?"

It isn't _better_ than hearing that she loves him, but it's honestly equivalent. He might have some issues, as a person.

But he also has a beautiful girl who loves him and wants to have sex with him more than she wants to have sex with anyone else. That's a pretty big upside. "I'll live," he says, and tugs her in for another kiss.

*

The next week, Lincoln sits down next to him at the bar. "So, you decided to set me up with your sister as part of a long scheme to get Clarke to have casual sex with you?"

Bellamy thinks this over and then shrugs. "I mostly wanted to see how many of our friends she'd proposition before she got to me."

"Ah."

"Sorry," he adds. "It was kind of shitty. I may not be, uh. Competent at emotions. I'll buy you a beer."

Lincoln snorts. "Clarke said you two sorted it out."

Judging from Lincoln's reaction, his smile must be ridiculous. He cannot bring himself to care at all. "Yeah. I'm still not sure I was competent, but we worked it out." He gets a handle on his smile, dials it back to normal and friendly instead of goofy and horrific. "But, uh, yeah. You could still make a move on my sister. That's a good idea even if I already worked out my side of the scheme."

"We went out last night," Lincoln says, sounding a little smug. "She called me and said you'd stopped being an idiot."

"Honestly, that's probably the nicest thing she's ever said about me." He signals the bartender for two beers, and holds his up once they arrive. "Cheers?" he offers.

Lincoln touches his glass to Bellamy's with a smile. "Cheers," he says, and they drink on it.


End file.
